Printing process.



' 4 J.LUTZ.

PRINTING moczss.

APPLICATION'FILED MAY 18, 1915.

Patented Oct. 17, 1916.

STATES PATENT. OFFICE."

' JULIUS LU'rz, or HEIDELBERG, GERMANY.

PRINTING raoonss;

To all whomit may concern:

Be it known that I, JULIUS LUTz, a subject of the Grand Duke of Hesse, German Empire, residing ,at the city of Heidel.-.

berg, in the Grand Duchy of Baden, Germany, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Printing Processes, of

which the followin :is aspecification.

My invention're ates to akprinting processv similar to lithography, that is to say,

. being based on the principle that the wetted background of the printing plate repulses the ink and the printing ink, repulsing the water, takes up the ink.

It is known that prints may be produced from zinc and alummium plates, by the picture of the writing being applied by aid of transfer paper to the prepared plate and the said plate thereupon being drawn around a cylinder. The printingis performed in the known manner by wetting the printing surface and subsequently rolling'the ink onto it, and finally receiving the impression on paper on the counter-cylinder. With this process the printing surface must bewetted' from outside, which has the great disadvantage, that the writing or the picture appearsdull and indistinct at a com-. paratively small output, because the liquid will, in wetting the surface, impair the transfer of theink and a deep black can only be secured at aslowxrevolution. The offset-process, by which the printing is first transferred from the zinc or aluminlum cyl-' inder to a rubber cylinder," therefore also allows of a slow speed only, as, also here,

- the printingsurface has to be wetted.

1 The novel feature of my invention con 6 sists therein that the printing is made directly from the original, which has been printed .on a suitable, flexible material.

1 Furthermore this material may be-wetted [from the back, so that when a cylinder When a rotary cylinder printing machine is employed, the wetting ,of the surface at each printing operation is dispensed with.

- J. I I The present inventlon'consists 1n the process of placinga flexible material, (which will absorb water and on which the writing or picture to befreproduced is printed in the'usual manner), ona printing, cylinder and printing from the same after the litho- I graphic printing system, that is to say, after subsequently wetting the said material and inking it.

as to absorb water.

printing machine is employed the wetting is effected from the Patented Oct. 17, 1916. I Application filed May 18, 1915. Serial No. 28,897.

inside of the cylinder on which the material carrying the original print, and servinga's printing surface, isplaced. When the whole surface of this materialhas been wetted, the wetted part will, at the subsequent inking with the ink roller, not take up the .ink, but the writing or drawing,

printed ontothe material will take up the ink and transfer it, at the subsequent print i ing operation, to the paper. The operation according ess-is as follows! I The mach'ne employedis shown. in diagram in Figure 1. Fig. 2 is a section'through the'cylinder' adapted'for wetting the material from inside. J v

InFigJI A is the printing cylinder on which is mounted the flexible, porous sheet containing the original matter to be printed. This original is a printed impression 'in a sential being that it should be porous so any suitable ink font F to adistributin and inking roller train D of well known type and to the wetted paper .on the printing cylinder A. f The ink adheres to the previously printed or Tinkedportions on the printed porous Ink is supplied ronriv to my new proc- .fatty or water-repellent ink, say, for ex- I I ample, apiece of paper that has previously been printed in the ordinary way; the espaper originally on cylinder A and is repell'ed by the wet unprinted portions, so that the lines take the ink from the printing train. inked design of this positive is'transferred as a reversed (sometimes called a negative) design "to a rubber or equivalent transfer roller in the manner of an offset. This transfer roller then transfers thedesign as a positive to the paperweb W on the impression cylinder The paper is contained in a roll and the web W is guided from this rollover guide, rolls G around the impression cylinder C, over guide roll E and between drawing rolls'H.. '1 The construction of press just described The original being a positive, the

is that common to. many forms of. web

printing presses, and no further description is deemed necessary. v v I On a' soft material which will take up 'a printing and is'permeable to water or jendosmotic, such. as paper, parchment, 'pre pared linen, shirting or the like material having the said properties the design to "be reproduced is printed by means Qfganfi ordinary printing press. Thisv material-thus printed serves, as hereinafter" described, aspr1nt transferrer. 'In a machine having three cylinders the first cylinder A serves to receive the printed material, (original), which is, however, not applied to the cylinderdirectly, but to a jacket of felt or the like on the cylinder. This jacket is intended to receive and store the water for wetting and to transmit the same to the original from the inside during the printing operation. 'For this purpose the cylinder A is and direc so constructed, that it can receive the water,

having its ends flanged as shown at a, which are bent over toward the axis and allow o f the water entering the interior thereof (see Fig. 2). The inner mantle b, on which' the jacket 0 is fitted,

will pass during the printing operation.

. For small editions the jacket may, also, be

made of such thickness, that one wetting of the same will suflice, such wetting, in this case, being made before the printing-is commenced. In the same manner the original may, according to its own thickness, print a small editlon with one single wetting or performed in the same manner. as with stereotype rotary'printing machine. The

take up any ink.

pression being "taken off: Theinking is inking rollers are'pressed against the printing cylinder A and there ink the design,

while the other parts of the original do not I claim: L'A printing process comprising wetting analready printed sheet of customary mathe f terial having the usual printed surface that a printed in a water-repellant ink, t y inking said already printed wetted sheet and printing-therefrom.

2. A printing process comprising wetting an already rinted sheet of paper as ordihas been -,nari1y used inprinting presses and prlnted is provided with fineperforations d, through which the water rewetting. It is, however, not intended to claim, that the wetting of the. surface of the original is not admissible; such outward wetting may also also be employed, only in this case the impressions will not be as good.. When the drawings, designs or the like.

' are ofsuch a character, that the impression may also be a negative, it is possible to make the impressions directly from the original. With letter press or writing, however, which are produced aspositives by the printing press, it is necessary to employ a transfer cylinder in order to avoid receiving a negative impression. This transferi's obtained,

the-.same as with the offset-machine, by means of a second cylinder B, which is covered. with indi'a rubber cloth and will, in knownmanner, transfer a positive impressionto the paper. The third cylinder C is the counter-cylinder which is employed for pressing thepaper tightly against the india rubber cylinder and for allowing of the imin the customary manner with the customary water-repellant ink, inking thewetted print and printing therefrom.

3. A process comprising wetting a custo mary print on paper customarily used -in printing presses, maintaining the paper wet from the! back thereof, inking the print, and printing from the inked print.

- 4. A printing process consisting inwetting of fabric, paper and the like customarily .used for making printing press impressions but not speciall prepared as a printing or impression sur ace and having aprinted impression thereon, the improvement which consists in wetting such already printed sheet from the back, inking the wetted sheet and rinting therefrom, either directly or byo set. f

In testimony whereof I have afiixed my signature in presence of two witnesses.

JULIUS LUTZ.

Witnesses: 1 i

C. TNNEss BROWN Frau KINZER. 

